This blog is my silo,
my storage of personal fodder for future harvesting.
A home for thoughts and ideas to ferment, grow and eventually ultimately ripen.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Day 3 .... the suicide

I look down and there is red string tied around my left
wrist.

Since the suicide of a middle school boy last Saturday I
have been doing crisis facilitating and counseling since Monday at the school
site. Today was the third day. I am exhausted, emotionally barren, and near
stoic. I arrived on site with an excel spreadsheet in hand that I created to
organize all of the psychologists as to which children needed follow-up
counseling today after this horrific tragedy. The list, like every day since Monday,
was daunting. All of the members of the crisis team looked so battered and worn.
We slapped on our battle faces and proceeded forward with the notion that the
children and staff were in more need of our services than we were tired. All
week I have experienced an odd feeling of exhaustion and adrenaline coursing
through me. It seems that each moment one or the other is the
pilot of my current existence.

I met with student after student. The shock is starting to
wear thin on their young hearts. The boy who killed himself just a few short
days ago has a sibling, she returned to school today. We, as the crisis team,
banded together to quickly create a plan in order to make the transition back
to school as seamless as humanly possible. I quietly questioned to myself whether
or not we could accomplish this goal. A priority concern was not having her
hounded by the other students who have been crazed with the need to know more
details about her brother’s suicide. We, like mothers, wanted to protect her
from any more pain. She presented in good spirits. I can only assume that she
was partially relieved to be at school and out of the horrifying grips of her
mother’s grief. Oh how it hurts to even think of the anguish that their mother
is experiencing. I shudder at the mere thought.

Two days ago we provided the children that we were
counseling with paper and markers to write cards to the family, draw pictures
of their emotions or simply to keep their hands busy to help yield the constant
flow of tears. Within an hour many of them had in fact created art, but not on the
paper provided. They had begun to tattoo and brand themselves, their arms,
legs, cheeks and foreheads. They wrote the dead child’s name all of their
exposed skin. As a team we decided that we shouldn’t supply the kids with art
supplies for the following day. We had to limit the suicide contagion factor
and ensure that this young boys’ suicide was not being glorified. Our primary
goal was to not encourage students that are drastically suffering from this
loss or other traumas in their life so they themselves will not contemplate or commit
suicide. Yesterday we did not provide them art supplies. We had learned through
many conversations with children who were very close to the child who killed
himself that his favorite color was red. We decided that we would supply a vast
amount of red yarn. The purpose was for the kids to tie a red piece of yarn
around their wrist in memory of their lost friend.

I look down and there is a red string tied around my left
wrist. I’m in awe that five inches of string can scream so many
emotions and horrors. The red string belts pent up pain from a young boy. It
shouts sheer and utter desperation from a child. While a simple red string
belts and shouts, the child lived silently with his anguish until he decided to
live no more. A red string communicates clearly; he could not and never will
again.

I look down and there is a red string tied around my left wrist
and I hear the wails of his mother. The type of wailing that comes from
somewhere so deep and horrific that you’ve never heard such a sound come from a
living being. I see her tears consuming her body and nearly drowning her entire
being. I see the blankness in her eyes, the hollow field where her son once occupied.
I see her hands clenched together over her heart as if trying to keep it inside
of her thin frail body. I see her knees giving way as she has no strength left
to keep her upright. I hear the trembling of her voice between screams of
torment. There is nothing comparable to a woman’s suffering who has lost her
child. There is nothing comparable to a mother’s suffering who has lost her
child to suicide.

I look down. There is a red string tied around my left wrist
and I want to take it off. I am consumed with the images of crying children and
devastated teachers. I am covered with questions of why and how. I see this red
string and I imagine all of the different variations as to what could have gone
on in this young boys mind. I question what caused him so much pain that he
gave up on himself and how he was provided with the courage to kill himself.
He did not attempt suicide, he committed suicide.

I look down. There is a red string tied around my left wrist
and I shed a tear, and another. Five inches of red string holds my emotions
captive. I cannot take it off.